Second Corinthians 3:18 says that we “are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord Spirit.”
When we with unveiled face are beholding and reflecting the glory of the Lord, He infuses us with the elements of what He is and what He has done. Thus, we are being transformed metabolically to have His life shape by His life power with His life essence, transfigured, mainly by the renewing of our mind (Rom. 12:2), into His image. Being transformed indicates that we are in the process of transformation.
The constitution of life involves the life essence, the life power, and the life shape. Every kind of life has these three things—the essence, the power, and the shape. For example, a carnation flower has an essence and a power; therefore, it is formed into a certain shape. As it grows with the life essence and by the life power, it is shaped into a particular form. It is the same with the divine life. This life has its essence, power, and shape. The shape of the divine life is the image of Christ. Thus, in 2 Corinthians 3:18 we have the thought of being transformed into the same image. This means that we will be shaped into the image of Christ. Based upon this fact and upon Paul’s use of the word transformed, we speak of being metabolically constituted. This term is based upon the concept of transformation into the image of Christ.
We need to be open to the divine life with its power, essence, and shape. As we open to the Lord, He as the life-giving Spirit enters into our being to infuse His life essence into us, to operate within us by His life power, and to shape us into His image. This is the constitution of life to make us ministers of the new covenant.
Paul and his co-workers were mirrors beholding and reflecting with an unveiled face the glory of Christ in order to be transformed into His glorious image. Man was made in the image of God (Gen. 1:26), and Colossians 1:15 says that Christ is the image of the invisible God. The glorious image unveiled in 2 Corinthians 3 is the divine image in Genesis 1:26. However, at the time of Genesis 1:26 Christ did not have the elements of incarnation, humanity, His all-inclusive death, and His wonderful resurrection. These elements have now been added to Christ by the process through which the Triune God has passed. Now the image of God is not only the image of divinity; it is the image of divinity mingled with humanity and constituted with the all-inclusive death and the wonderful resurrection.
The image in 2 Corinthians 3:18 is the image of the resurrected and glorified Christ. The “same image” means that we are being conformed to the resurrected and glorified Christ, being made the same as He is (Rom. 8:29). According to the usage in the New Testament, image refers not merely to an outward form but to the outward expression of the inner being. The expression of what we are is our image; our image is exactly according to who we are inwardly in our being.
God’s way of transforming is through enlightening. Wherever the light shines, life is supplied. By rejecting the light, we are rejecting the supply of life. A believer who experiences the greatest amount of transformation is the one who is absolutely open to the Lord. We need to pray, “Lord, I am fully open to You. I want to keep opening to You. My whole being is open—my heart, my mind, my will, and my emotions. Keep shining. Search me thoroughly. Enlighten and enliven me. I will accept it fully.” In this way, the light will penetrate into every area, and simultaneously life will be supplied to us. Consequently, we will be transformed into the image of Christ.
Although transformation is a change, it involves more than a mere outward change. Transformation involves a metabolic change, an inward change in life. Such a metabolic change requires the working within us of the element of the divine life. This produces a change not only in appearance and behavior but also in life, nature, and intrinsic essence. In the process of metabolism a new element is supplied to an organism. This new element replaces the old element and causes it to be discharged. Therefore, as the process of metabolism takes place within a living organism, something new is created within it to replace the old element, which is carried away. Metabolism, therefore, includes three matters: first, the supplying of a new element; second, the replacing of the old element with this new element; and third, the discharge or the removal of the old element so that something new may be produced.
This metabolic function, on the one hand, adds the element of the divine life of Christ into our entire being and, on the other hand, discharges the old and negative things from within us. Consequently, we have a change not only in our inward nature but also in our outward image so that we express the image of Christ. Consummately, this image of Christ is the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21:2). Transformation results in our becoming the New Jerusalem.
When the Lord, who is the Spirit, came into us, He came into our spirit (2 Tim. 4:22). Now we are joined to the Lord and have become one spirit with Him (1 Cor. 6:17). The divine Spirit and the human spirit are mingled and blended together to form one spirit. We are one with the Lord not in the body or in the mind; we are one with the Lord in our spirit. When the Lord came into our spirit, a reaction took place in our being. That reaction was our regeneration. Regeneration is the transformation of the spirit. At the moment we believed, our spirit was transformed by Christ as the divine life.
Because we have been regenerated, our spirit is fully transformed. Now we must undergo the continual transformation of the rest of our being, particularly our soul (2 Cor. 3:17-18; Rom. 12:2; Eph. 4:23). The soul is a very important part of our being. For our soul to be transformed means that our mind, emotion, and will are transformed. If we are transformed in our spirit but not in our soul, it means that although we have Christ as life in our spirit, we do not have much of Christ in our soul. Our need is for Christ to increase within us all the time, that is, to spread from our spirit into the three parts of our soul. When we are transformed into His image, we will think, feel, and decide just as Christ thinks, feels, and decides. When we consider matters, we will consider them as the Lord does; when we love or hate, we will love or hate as Christ does; and when we choose, we will choose as the Lord does and give up and reject what the Lord gives up and rejects. When our entire soul has been transformed into the image of Christ, we will have the image of Christ in our daily life.
We need to let Him saturate us and permeate us. The more we behold Him and the more we reflect Him, the more He saturates and permeates us to transform us into His own image that we might express God. This is not only the Lord mingling Himself with us but also the Lord saturating us and even soaking us. When Christ comes into us and saturates us, we are “Christified.” Christ as the life-giving Spirit saturates us until we are fully Christified. By being Christified, we become Christ. This is why we are Christians. Christ has come into us and has Christified us so that we are now Christians. Christians are simply Christ. This is the corporate Christ as the expression of God (1 Cor. 12:12). The Lord’s intention is to recover Christification. We need to be Christified. The church life is the glorious Christification. The Lord’s recovery is to Christify every believer until he obtains a total Christification. This Christification is simply the expression of God.